It might help the flow of conversation/help others understand your viewpoint better if you share a bit about your experience (in martial arts and/or in real SD situations), so we know where you're coming from.
I grew up in and around the parts of Boston and NE the tourists don't frequent. You learned how to handle your **** early and often on those streets. Wrestling and football made school interesting. After college (when I graduated I was ranked 13th in the nation, NCAA Div. 1), I took a year to heal and save a very modest amount of $$ then sold my car and bought a one-way ticket to the furthest place from home I could identify on a globe. Turned out to be a city in the middle of China. I landed, wandered around for a few days, ran into a guy from England, and after 30-40 beers he agreed to try and get me a job teaching at a university in the city where he had been working for about a year. His girlfriend at the time also introduced me to a very nice young lady, but that's another story.It might help the flow of conversation/help others understand your viewpoint better if you share a bit about your experience (in martial arts and/or in real SD situations), so we know where you're coming from.
Anyway, I met some people who knew some people who knew some people and I got to training early, early morning before teaching classes and late evening after teaching and learned as much of as many Chinese martial arts as I could. I also met some guys who wrestled for the provincial wrestling team that competed in China's version of national comps. Worked out with that team a lot, so I managed to keep pretty busy. During all this I befriended a lot of folks who the local Han tended to shun. Some Uyghur folks in particular tended to raise the ire of local Han farmers, so we got into some pretty interesting street fights late at night when the night markets were letting out and folks had a good amount of booze in them. Some hair-raising **** went down during those. My friend, the guy from England, was no fighter, so he got pretty freaked out during some of these when he happened to be around.
During Spring Festival one year me, the British guy and two Japanese ladies we were seeing at the time traveled around China as widely as we could, and here and there ran into some folks who had a beef with Japanese people or American people and various unpeaceful events took place accordingly. I should say though that most people were astonishingly welcoming, generous and hospitable to all of us. The great, great majority of folks were so wonderful to all of us that it really left a lasting impression on me. Anyway, while we were traveling, we took in some places along the southern border of China and Burma and Laos. Some of the villages along here seemed to be built around fighting rings where a lot of Chinese MA and the Laotian/Burman versions of Thai boxing and some sorts of Silat were practiced and tested straight out. Almost everywhere we went, the local folks wanted to put on an MMA kind of thing to see how I could do against their local guys. A lot of these guys were tough as hell, but I acquitted myself well enough to earn the respect of the locals. A few times I got the impression that some of the pro guys were going a little easy on me, but I wasn't about to make an issue of it. I had enough bruises and blackeyes as it was. Most combat sport guys everywhere in the world (more stories there) share a respect with anyone who puts their *** on the line. So, our trip along this border had its fair share of interesting experiences in local-made gyms/rings/streets. It would take a long time to recount them all (one actually involved a sort of fireworks battle - ridiculous).
Family matters called me back to the states, and when that was resolved I decided to take a job in Japan. During the years that I lived and worked there I had the opportunity to learn and practice various Japanese martial arts. These included Kempo, Kendo, Aikido, Iaido, and several others to lesser degrees. While working out at a local gym one day I met a guy who ran his own Nihon Kempo club, and he invited me to go teach his students some wrestling. They did a lot of free sparring, so I had the opportunity to go live with guys from a number of different backgrounds several times a week. When they went live they really went live, so that was fun. I didn't get into many street altercations during my years in Japan. Mostly with other gaijin who were drunk and bad-mouthing the US. I of course made time to continue practicing the things I had learned during my years in China as well.
Once again personal family matters called me back to Boston, and this time I became involved in business interests that mostly kept me there. I made a point of hitting different gyms/clubs/dojos around the greater Boston area on a regular basis. Sort of a circuit of boxing, Muay Thai, Capoeira, CMA, JMA, Ninjutsu, etc. When MMA became a thing, I hit a few of those gyms too. A wrestling club in one of the sketchy parts of Boston was a regular weekly stop. As will happen, there were incidents now and again on weekends. Especially when hanging out with some friends who were not good at drinking or fighting, or controlling themselves. Career interests continued to develop, and at one point I had to go to Korea to train and manage a few branches of a hagwan. I was there for about 7 months. Not long, but I made a point of finding opportunities to train Ssireum and Taekkyeon as much as I could. Time passes and many things transpired over the years and decades, but I have always trained and built on all I have learned. I am now teaching at an inner city school district, and I am also head wrestling coach for all the high schools in the city.
So, that's about where I'm at.